Case Study COSC 3707 Spring 2021

Introduction
For this case, students are to review the material provided in this document, make any necessary
assumptions and the students role is to be the lead systems analyst. You will note that in the
letter from the director, it is aimed at the team in this particular case, which is quite normal.

You are to produce the following deliverables to respond to the initial letter and also provide
information back to the IT group:

1. A recommended approach on how to proceed – that is how do you recommend providing a

solution (for example internal or external, etc.), (this includes the methodology chosen)
2. A presentation for consumption by the business (Hank) – no more than 10 slides
3. A workplan for the entire development – which includes a baseline project plan
4. An initial set of requirements – that is a requirements specification that includes functional
and non-functional
5. A proposed architecture for the solution
6. A process and database design with appropriate specifications
7. A project charter
8. Additional questions and assumptions that require answers that would be needed to update
the proposal – since this is a case.

(Note that some of the documents are for consumption by the customer, the others are for internal IT
consumption as they view for the business. Unlike the letter language, many organizations today
would include the sourcing recommendation).

For your submission, you will need to submit a single document (Word or pdf) that contains the
above deliverables. As material is covered in class, you should complete the work on this case – do
not leave until the end of the course. The order of the final document is up to the student but must
make sense to the reader and will be evaluated. (Do not use the order as shown in the above list)

Include a reference section that identifies any external sources that were utilized.

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 Consolidated Industries
Memorandum
To: Your Systems Analysis Team
From: James Duffy, Director of Business Systems
Date: September 25, 2020
Phone: 555-3786

I just received the attached memo from Hank Jeffries, an old friend of mine who is now in charge of
Vehicle Management. He needs help in analyzing several problems in his department. I would like
you to meet with Hank and explore his situation.

From what Hank says in his memo and from a prior discussion I had with him, you should carefully
consider his situation. I doubt that there is a ready-made solution. I am not sure they really know
what their problems are. I do not know how much you can find out from one interview with Hank
and his staff, so I do not expect you to know how to solve his problems from just this one meeting. In
fact, I do not think Hank expects us to come up with a solution for his problems right now.

You should meet with Hank and his staff and find out what kind of help he would like from us. This
will be a “free” session, part of developing potential business for us with his department. After you
meet with Hank, organize your thoughts into a recommendation for Hank and me on what kind of
analysis we might do for Vehicle Management. Prepare a presentation that you can take to Hank to
sell our business analysis services. Remember, we are a profit center; we have to sell clients on the
idea that we can help them solve their business problems. We do not give free advice anymore! If
we tell Hank what to do, he is likely to hire someone else to implement the solution.

Hank is a pretty astute manager, although still learning about his new department. So, you should
develop a clear proposal and figure out what key points are necessary to sell our services. This is a
good opportunity for you to generate new business for Business Systems. How is that for a
challenge?

Good luck. You are on your own!

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 Consolidated Industries
Memorandum
To: James Duffy, Director of Business Systems
From: Hank Jeffries, Manager of Vehicle Management
Date: September 23, 2020
Phone: 555-2487

Jim, it was good to see you again last week at the company picnic. Time has passed quickly since we
graduated from Mid-State University. I'll never forget our I-core group!! Again, congratulations on
your promotion. The people in Systems always seem to have a leg up on the rest of us.

Thanks for letting me bend your ear about what I think is going on here in Vehicle Management. As I
said, I am just starting to understand this place after spending all those years in personnel. It is a big
change for me. Even after a month in this job, I still have much to learn. My problem is, I am not
sure how to begin to understand what is happening here. I have been thinking all weekend about your
offer to help my department look at some of its problems. I think you might just be able to help. Let
me explain our situation a little more carefully, this time without trying to eat a Brat at the same time.

Briefly, Vehicle Management is responsible for the corporation's fleet of executive cars, rental
vehicle pool, and other company owned vehicles. We purchase, plate, maintain, and sell all corporate
vehicles. At any time, we have approximately 300 vehicles (cars, trucks, etc.) in our fleet. We have
to place and track new vehicle orders, inventory all vehicles and record who is assigned each vehicle,
update vehicle maintenance history and requirements to meet manufacturer warranties, and handle all
internal billing.

Vehicle Management is a profit center within the corporation. My office staff of six clerical and
professional workers handles all management functions (plus we are also responsible for the
mechanics in the garage). The garage handles all routine functions when a vehicle comes in from use
(cleaning, gassing, parking, etc.), but we decide and tell the garage personnel when preventive and
routine maintenance are to be done or when to take a vehicle out of the fleet. We decide when to turn
over vehicles and what vehicles to order. We handle titling, plating, invoicing, and inventorying of
vehicles. We also must keep track of the driving history (accidents, tickets, etc.) of all employees
who use company vehicles. We do this with very little personal contact with employees since none of
my staff work in the garage.

We seem to have a variety of problems. More specifically, we have had difficulty:

▪ keeping up with the ever-increasing workload in the office (e.g., the department has had a 50
percent growth in the number of vehicles use transactions in each of the past three years)

▪ producing special information for our use or for our customers (e.g., it takes us a lot of time to
prepare summaries of vehicle use by customer department, authorization code, or event)

▪ selling vehicles at the best time (we can get the best trade-in price when we sell a vehicle with
the right combination of mileage and age)

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 ▪ processing vehicle requests for special events (e.g., customer promotional activities, community
service programs, or officer meetings)

▪ preparing a comprehensive history of use and maintenance on a given vehicle

▪ sending out and tracking follow-up maintenance reminder notices to those assigned a vehicle

Jim, we have tried everything we can think of and, yet, our problems seem to get worse. We operate
on very low margins, and corporate does not show any interest in our problems. Consequently, we do
not have much money to spend. We do not want an elegant solution, just one that works. I am not
sure what the real causes of our problems are. Maybe our office procedures are messed up, maybe it
is the computer system we use, or maybe I need to add staff. I sure wish you could tell me how to
figure out what my real problems are!

I know the people in the Business Systems group are real computer experts, but I am not sure our
computer system is the problem. The department purchased fleet management software two years
ago when it saw that our company’s growth was going to be explosive. The system runs on the
corporate mainframe and handles our basic data needs. We have one terminal in our office and one in
the garage. We try to operate like a real rental car agency since corporate staff can rent from us or
any local or national chain agency. “Customer service” seems to be important to those who rent from
us, but none of us have ever worked for one of “the big guys.” So, I am not sure we are doing what
our customers want.

I would like to schedule a time when several of my staff and I can meet with a couple of the business
consultants in your department and discuss what you might be able to do for us. Then, maybe you
can give me a proposal or outline on how we can proceed. I will have Sally call you in a couple of
days and we will set up a time to talk.

cc: Stan Fox (Vehicle Disposition)

Sue Quinlan (Rental Operations)
Jack Sutton (Vehicle Maintenance)

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The students should recognize the need for further study, and design a project plan that does the
appropriate analysis.

Your “Personas” in the Case: Descriptions for the three Vehicle Management staff involved in the
interview follow.

▪ Hank Jeffries, Manager of Vehicle Management: Hank Jeffries has been in the job one
month. He had been in personnel for 10 years, and this is his first assignment outside of
personnel. He is just learning about the Vehicle Management Department, so he has limited
knowledge about how his department works or what his staff does in any detail. That is, he
frequently has to answer “I don’t know” to questions about department operations and history.
Jeffries recently received his MBA after going to school part-time for five years. The company
has assigned him to Vehicle Management as a way to see if he has potential for further
advancement. Jeffries was an HR major as an undergraduate ten years ago. In school he had
one systems-oriented course, but it involved mainframe computing in FORTRAN with punched
cards. His work in personnel had no contact with systems. Hank is concerned primarily with
the customer service issue mentioned near the end of the case, but being new to the department,
he cannot articulate very well what he means by customer service. He does not understand the
vehicle rental business, including how to buy or sell the fleet.

▪ Sue Quinlan, Head of Rental and Assignment (oversees all vehicle use): Sue has been one of
the most vocal to Hank about the need for changes in Vehicle Management procedures. Sue
came to Consolidated six months ago after working for four years as a travel agent. Sue is
progressive, but she does not know the operations of the department very well, yet. Sue has not
gotten along very well with the other two managers in the department since her customer service
philosophy is somewhat at odds with the approach others take. Sue is openly critical of what she
has seen in the department and has many concerns, often without hard data, that the department
could function much better.

▪ Jack Sutton, Garage Operations Supervisor: Jack is a card-carrying bureaucrat. He rules the
garage operations with an iron hand, and not a very polite one at times. He sees his job as
controlling a company asset, not providing customer service. Jack has been around the longest
and holds on to old habits. He schedules all maintenance work on vehicles and decides when to
outsource work. He also handles (through Helen McGill) all correspondence with company
employees concerning service of rental and assigned vehicles. Jack and Sue openly feud due to
their different perspectives (Jack--control and Sue--customer service).

Vehicle Management Culture: The department has several internal conflicts, which should come
out in the interview. First, the professional and clerical staff is a mixture of first and second level
managers (and clericals), some of whom view the department as managing vehicles (corporate assets)
and others of whom want to provide service to those who are assigned vehicles. Second, there has
been considerable turn-over in department staff, so there is neither much organizational memory or
rapport among the staff. Decision-making procedures have not been formalized, so the managers all
make independent decisions. Communication between managers is poor. Hank, being new to the
department, often gets caught in the crossfire between other managers. The other managers are still
trying to “test” Hank and are somewhat envious and upset that he was brought in over them. For
example, Jack is not reluctant to say such things as: “Hank, you don’t really understand my
problems.” or “Once you’ve been here as long as I have...”

Key Items of Information:

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 (1) Vehicle Management Department Staff –

(2) Vehicle Management Organization Chart --

(3) Vehicle Management Department Operations: Overview --

(4) Memo from Sue Quinlan to Hank Jeffries --

Questions

Question: Where are company vehicles located and used?

Answer: The company has employees in several dispersed buildings in the metropolitan area, but the
vehicle garage and pool are centrally located at one site, the corporate headquarters building.
Vehicles are used both in and out of state.

Question: Who rents/gets vehicles from Vehicle Management?

Answer: Customers are only company employees. Customers are both individuals and departments.
Often the person placing a reservation is different from the person actually using the vehicle (e.g., a
secretary for a manager, an event manager for a group of volunteer drivers). Each of the top ten
corporate executives is entitled to a car of his/her choice ($35,000 price limit), and each of the 30
traveling sales staff also, if they request, is assigned a car. Some departments (like the courier
service, cafeteria service, building maintenance) also have vehicles permanently assigned. All other
customers rent for specified time periods.

Question: How often do you change vehicles in the fleet?

Answer: Executives receive a new car each year. The sales staff will have cars for two years or
40,000 miles. At the end of this time, the car goes into the rental fleet if needed, or is sold at auction.
Cars and minivans are kept in the fleet based upon a rather complex calculation that minimizes total
operating cost. This is different for each make and model of vehicle and relates to its resale value,
age, mileage, expected maintenance costs, and other factors. Stan Fox handles these decisions, so
you should speak to him about the details. Trucks, busses, and maintenance vehicles are kept as long
as possible, basically until maintenance costs get prohibitive.

Question: How satisfied are you with your computer system?

Answer: Vehicle Management’s computer system is a comprehensive transaction processing system,
but it does not provide decision support. It handles all billing, vehicle purchasing and receiving,
vehicle retirement, vehicle tracking, and other operational functions. However, it is not a commercial
reservation system. The terminal screens require special training to use, so employees outside the
department have to work through department staff. The system does not print out any documentation
when an employee picks up or drops off a car. All paperwork is processed by sending written
verification from batch printouts in intra-company mail or through internal charges. Internal charges
are made without countersignatures or any checks. There are no checks against renting department
budgets to verify that the department has sufficient funds allocated.

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Question: Are employees careful when using company vehicles?
Answer: Jack does not find employees cooperative. He thinks that employees are not good about
returning vehicles on time, and those assigned vehicles (individuals and departments) are not prompt
about bringing vehicles in for scheduled and required maintenance. Sue thinks that, in addition, many
reservations are canceled at the last minute or when there is a ‘no show’. Often vehicles are requested
with just a couple of hours warning. Accidents with company vehicles may or may not be reported
by the employee involved. Often Vehicle Management hears about a claim on an accident from an
insurance company or the police. Employees may have renting privileges revoked or at least Vehicle
Management can notify their supervisors if abuse is habitual.

Question: Are you competitive with car rental companies?

Answer: Sue tells employees that Vehicle Management has two advantages over commercial rental
agencies: price and location. Even though they are a profit center, Vehicle Management just tries to
break even. In each of the last three years they have shown a slight profit, but not substantial enough
with which to do anything major. Their price is about 10 percent less than the commercial agencies.
Being located at the main headquarters building is an advantage for most employees, but not all.

Question: Are customers satisfied with the reservation system?

Answer: We are not sure. Every once in a while, a customer will mention what a nice car he had on
his last trip, and we either do not have that kind of vehicle or cannot find any record of that customer
using one of our cars when he said he did.

Question: What are the procedures for checking in a car in the garage?
Answer: Mileage, car condition, etc. are entered on the terminal in the garage. We clean and gas
the car, and do a light inspection to make sure everything is working. We change the oil every 3,000
miles and change the tires every 40,000 miles. We rotate tires every 10,000 miles. We make sure all
required maintenance is done during the warranty period, and then do regular maintenance thereafter.

Question: What does (Sally, Helen, Margie) do?

Answer: Hank has not gotten into the details of Sally’s job, yet. She basically runs the office (buys
forms, supplies, etc.) and organizes financial records for Hank. Helen reviews vehicle use
information and tells the garage mechanics when to service vehicles. She looks at information about
the condition of vehicles as they come in and contacts the renter or assignee for more information
when needed. Margie answers the reservation phone and enters vehicle reservations into the
computer system. Besides this overview, Hank, Jack, and Sue do not really know much about what
the office staff does on a day-to-day basis.

Question: Are you understaffed in any of your operations (like the garage)?
Answer: No. We can outsource some of the garage work, and we can keep up with the requests for
vehicles.

Question: With the 50 percent volume growth in the past few years, how have you coped with
the extra work?
Answer: We were probably over staffed before. As a profit center, we can increase or decrease
garage and office staff as we can afford them.

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Question: How well do the office staff and garage mechanics get along?
Answer: They do not get along very well. They have very little contact with one another other than
by phone and written instructions. Jack does not think that the office staff understands the need to run
an efficient garage operation.

Question: What would you like your computer system to do that it does not do now?
Answer: Jack and Sue would like to customize new reports or inquiries as needed. They want to
pick fields, sort the data, and show summaries. They cannot give examples of what I need, but they
are willing to explore that in another discussion later. Besides that, they do not really use the system
that much. Sally and Margie are the main users. Hank has no insight to this question.

Question: Sue, what do you see as some of the problems in the department?
Answer: As I told Hank in my memo, I think we have to become more customer focused. We are
losing business to commercial rental agencies, our computer system is not very helpful in our
competitive situation, and we have to find new ways to satisfy our customers. I keep thinking back to
my experience as a travel agent and see a lot of opportunities for us. I have not had time to
investigate my concerns; maybe you can help us do that.

Question: Jack, what do you see as some of the problems in the department?
Answer: I am not sure there are many problems, at least everything seemed to be working fine until
a few months ago. I am having trouble now getting cars serviced in time for their next reservations,
and Sue is always bugging me about having the garage people promptly enter information about the
vehicles. I cannot understand why executives, salespersons, and departments with assigned vehicles
will not bring in vehicles for required maintenance when told to do so. Don’t they realize that if they
want their vehicle to work when they use it, the vehicle has to be serviced regularly?

Question: What is being done to improve communication within the department?

Answer: Hank, Sue, and Jack just started meeting every Monday morning to review issues. Hank
serves as a moderator, and asks questions. Hank is concerned about everyone working together
better.

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xxvii
 Vehicle Management Department Staff

Biographies of Interviewees: The three Vehicle Management staff involved in the interview are:

▪ Hank Jeffries, Manager of Vehicle Management: Hank Jeffries has been in the job one
month. He had been in personnel for 10 years, and this is his first assignment outside of
personnel. He is just learning about the Vehicle Management Department, so he has limited
knowledge about how his department works or what his staff does in any detail. Jeffries recently
received his MBA after going to school part-time for five years. The company has assigned him
to Vehicle Management as a way to see if he has potential for further advancement. Jeffries was
an HR major as an undergraduate ten years ago. In school he had one systems-oriented course,
but it involved mainframe computing in FORTRAN with punched cards. His work in personnel
had no contact with systems.

▪ Sue Quinlan, Head of Rental and Assignment (oversees all vehicle use): Sue has been one of
the most vocal to Hank about the need for changes in Vehicle Management procedures. Sue
came to Consolidated six months ago after working for four years as a travel agent.

▪ Jack Sutton, Garage Operations Supervisor: He schedules all maintenance work on vehicles
and decides when to outsource garage work. He also handles all correspondence with company
employees concerning service of rental and assigned vehicles.

Department Staff: One manager is responsible for vehicle purchasing and selling (Stan Fox),
another for managing vehicle maintenance and repair (Jack Sutton), and a third manager oversees the
rental and assignment operations (Sue Quinlan). The three clerical staff handle vehicle reservations
(Margie Hall, who reports to Sue), billing and receivables (Sally Ryan, who also serves as office
manager, and who reports to Hank), and coordination with the garage (Helen McGill, who reports to
Jack).

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 Vehicle Management Department Operations

Overview

Company Location: The company has employees in several dispersed buildings in a metropolitan
area, but the vehicle garage and pool are centrally located at one site, the corporate headquarters
building. Vehicles are used both in and out of state.

Customers: Company employees are the only customers. Customers are both individuals and
departments. Often the person placing a reservation is different from the person actually using the
vehicle (e.g., a secretary for a manager, an event manager for a group of volunteer drivers). Each of
the top ten corporate executives is entitled to a car of his/her choice ($35,000 price limit), and each of
the 30 traveling sales staff also, if they request, is assigned a car. Some departments (like the courier
service, cafeteria service, building maintenance) also have vehicles permanently assigned. All other
customers rent for specified time periods.

The Fleet: The fleet includes cars, minivans, trucks, two small buses, and some maintenance
vehicles. It does not include forklifts or other such vehicles used in manufacturing settings. Vehicles
are rented for varying amounts of time -- some for a day (e.g., a day trip to visit a customer), some for
months (e.g., for a given project), and some on assignment (e.g., top executives, traveling sales staff,
or the catering department). All vehicles are maintained in the company garage or Jack Sutton may
choose to send a vehicle out to a private repair service (e.g., to do warranty work, to handle an
overload situation or to do body work). Vehicle Management must know where a vehicle is at all
times (that is, whether it is with an employee, in the garage, or out for repair).

Authorization: Not just anyone can rent or is assigned a vehicle from the fleet. Each rental or
assignment must be done under an approved authorization code, which is an internal billing number
(departments, projects, products, special events, and individuals receive authorization codes).

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 Consolidated Industries
Memorandum
To: Hank Jeffries, Manager of Vehicle Management
From: Sue Quinlan, Rental and Assignment
Date: September 10, 2020
Phone: 555-2486

Hank, now that you have settled in to your job, I wanted to outline a few of my concerns about the
operation of the department. I will be brief, and then we can discuss these and other issues at your
convenience.

▪ Corporate departments are demanding more information about their operation costs, including
vehicle use. Some of the commercial vehicle rental agencies I used to work with as a travel
agent have developed systems that can print monthly, or on demand, a picture of vehicle rental
use and costs, broken down by person, type of vehicle, and other parameters, for their corporate
clients. Our computer system has no capabilities in this area. Further, I am told the system is
programmed in COBOL under CICS; Systems tells me they are moving away from this
platform, and they no longer have much expertise in such technologies.

▪ We have no internal marketing function for our department, and I suspect that we are losing
business to commercial companies. However, there is no hard data on this. I would like for us
to consider adding a marketing manager and restructuring my job with this new position; the
goal is to be proactive in promoting the department’s product. Again, the computer system has
no features that would support a marketing function.

▪ I would like for us to consider selling vehicles to employees when the vehicles are retired rather
than selling them to car brokers at auctions. The new manager could handle this function.

▪ Jack Sutton keeps telling me that trucks and utility vehicles pose a special concern for him.
Since these vehicles are kept longer than cars, proper servicing of them is crucial for a long life
and greatest use.

▪ I think that we have to be more customer oriented in the way we do business. For example, we
(especially Jack) have had a history of not being very tolerant with a customer department's
needs when we schedule routine maintenance. For example, Jack has not instituted any way to
reserve replacement vehicles for a department when its vehicle is in for scheduled service.

Let me know when you would like to talk about these issues. If you know of any way we could get
some help thinking about these issues, I would be glad to discuss my concerns with anyone.

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